Improving rail reliability is a “multi-year war”, said Mr Khaw, who added that calling for a leadership change with each disappointment would be a “sure strategy for failure”

Hey Desmond Kuek was brought in (or “volunteered”) five years ago. So how long more will he be allowed to disappoint?

Did he, when he “volunteered” ask for “5 + x” number of years to make “SMRT great again” or was promised “5 + x” years to make “SMRT great again”? If he asked for, or was given a specific number of years to make “SMRT great again” we must be told the number and the reason for that number.

Otherwise five years on the job, and still no results sounds like jobs for the generals.

And this is BS

Due to budgetary considerations faced by the government decades ago and the island’s land scarcity, the design of the North-South and East-West lines — Singapore’s oldest MRT lines which were opened in 1987 — is not ideal.

And overcoming the constraints would require the halting of operations for an extended period and at large costs to taxpayers, Transport Minister Khaw Boon Wan told the House on Tuesday (Nov 7).

For instance, the two lines, which account for about 60 per cent of the MRT ridership, have relied only on one depot in Bishan over the last 30 years because of “budget constraints” at the time of design.

…

Budgets were not the only constraint. Citing the example of train systems such as those in London and New York, Mr Khaw said he was “quite puzzled” by how the trains there could run 24 hours while allowing engineering work to be done.

While these lines were designed as far back as a century ago when land was cheap, he has also realised that the networks catered for many side-tracks, such that trains could run on alternate tracks. “That’s why they were able to continue running 24 hours, not necessarily along the same tracks. It will go to the same stations but there are bypasses … And that’s how a well-designed network ought to be,” he said. Again, Singapore does not have this “luxury”, he said.

Not having these “luxuries” means that there should have been a lot more emphasis on preventive maintenance. It’s now clear that this was lacking, hence the present rush to fix the system before the next GE.

And btw, land was (and is) expensive in HK too. And the British administrators were not exactly spendthrift in their MRT construction budget.

THE TRUTH IS LEE-jiapore is WAY OVERLOADED with OVERPOPULATION, the pressure on land, resources and DUMBASS CRONYISM of multi-million dollar backdoor jobs for the boys and girls in PAPpys hypocritical meritocracy totally fiacked up this public transportation network.

PAPpys preach openly NO DISCONTINUITIES in the next generational leadership – they want a lazy, take it easy, overpaid jobs of doing nothing to continue.

And 70% of those daft peasants of nodding cow TOO STUPID TO EVEN BEGINNING TO DISCOVER THEY ARE STUPID TO IMPOSSIBILITY silently acquiescing to this INCOMPETENCE AND EXCLUSIVE PARASITING ON THIS PUBLIC WELFARE PURSE.

Don’t come and give some bullsh** reason now, Mr Khaw. Aren’t you and many others paid millions? The best talents money can buy? Singapore is paying you to solve problems, hard complex problems which no normal talents can solve. Is this all you can offer?

Yes he is spot on Singapore does not have the ‘luxury’ but that’s because we are plagued by self-inflicted issues.
I tell you this.
Bringing in trucks of unproductive foreigner population requires space, lots of it.
Being late by a decade compared to Hong Kong to launch and hone a MRT meant more space required for cars on the road.
You really think ministers, perm secs, agency heads, transport operator heads support public transport ? You think URA is honest enough to state how many car parks there are in these places ? They tell you in schools to be honest but they are not like that. The generous amount of car parks allocated to them also take up space.
Too many jiak liao bees in public transport, including the parachuted management team in smrt take up space.
So he is right. We don’t have the luxury of bypass tracks.
There’s no need to be puzzled how others have done it, he only needs to have the courage to admit that he is either a slow learner or hiding something that’s all.

It is not disappointment but accountability and responsibility. Without accountability and responsibility, you are doomed to fail in anything in life. PAP and their cronies are living in a world of entitlements in the expense of tax payers.

“Budgetary considerations” is a lot of bull when PAP has been hiding reserves in self-funding GLCs for decades.

“Land scarcity” is another “red-herring” PAP likes to use. The size of the country is irrelevant.

“Design of MRT is not ideal”. Another lame excuse from incompetent PAP. Why is it not ideal? Is it really the design? I don’t think so. The real problem is the construction. Typical PAP practice. Lowest bidder get the job. It also means lower quality (shoddy) work. PAP believes in own bullshit of “good and cheap”.

“… when land was cheap”. Another BS from KBW. Land is ALWAYS cheap for the Government because State Land is free. Any payment to SLA for land is just putting money from left pocket to right pocket. It is still free for Government as a whole. Moreover, the Government has the power to compulsorily acquire land at a on price set by Government Valuer

What really needs “fixing” is not the MRT but PAP. “Fix” (throw it out of Parliament) PAP at the next GE is the only way to fix the MRT. The rot start at the head.

IMHO, methinks the fault lies with the Lees penchant for recruiting dwarf men. I’m not anti-shorties myself as I’m not that tall at 5*5* myself. But look at the shorty ministers in the past….Dhanabalan, WKS, MBTan and?
What good have they done whilst raking in million$ salaries and bonuses over several years?
WKSeng left in a huff & puff after the Mas Selamat fiasco. Mabok Tan left after he made a mess of the HDB policies etc and Dhana left after he disagreed with Ops Spectrum in 1987 (?). Now it’s dwarf-man KBH*s turn….making a mess of the MRT system. Look at tall Ministers like TCH and OTC….done more good than bad unlike the shorties.
Advice to the Loong…..pl not to recruit anyone shorter than 5^5 anymore? Pretty please?
MC
14.11.17

Give excuses and deflect away blame, this the trades ark of KBW! The other ministers shoul learn from him to cling no on their multi million dollar jobs , this is life if you are at the top, you can say and do what you want! PM Lee has not said anything abt trains adults although commuters and businesses are crying aloud for solutions! DK KBW and other top guns iin SMRT and LTA are paid sky high salaries, no clues, no solutions! This is meritocracy in SG, we have the highest paid PM and ministers, nothing can be done just bear with it world’s first class transport,first world nation!

S’pore MRT lines were never designed for a 50% additional population boom that had occurred between 2004 to 2011 i.e. PAP’s open door policy until the 2011 GE loss of Aljunied-Hougang GRC changed that.
Two things are very clear when we compared S’pore’s MRT to the rest of the world:
1. OVERHEAD CATENARY SYSTEM VS 3RD RAIL
S’pore’s MRT system is primarily 3rd rail except for the N-E line which is an overhead catenary system. Simply, overhead catenary system runs on overhead electrical wiring system while 3rd rail uses an electrified 3rd rail to power the trains.
In Japan & HK, the predominant MRT rail system used is the overhead catenary system. For the London Underground & NY Metro – the system used was the 3rd rail & both cities have their system for many years – far longer the SMRT system. The overhead catenary system can take a higher passenger load than 3rd rail.
The 3rd rail system is a cheaper option & has less maintenance issues BUT it can’t carry a heavier load unlike the overhead catenary system. That’s why in heavy populated cities like Tokyo & HK, overhead catenary system is the default system.
After S’pore absorbed a 50% increase in artificial population growth between 2004 to 2011. SMRT’s 3rd rail system started to creak & breakdown but there were additional reasons.
The lack of clear maintenance focus during ex-CEO Cleopatra Saw Phaik Hwa’s tenure who instead concentrated on the retail push of MRT stations & was oblivious to the increasing load put on SMRT trains by exponential ridership – it culminated in the Great SMRT breakdown of 15 Dec 2011.
After Paper General Desmond Kuek replace Cleopatra Saw, the incidence of MRT breakdowns continued their breaking down pattern & even increase in intensity & severity – the frequency of occurrence had increased. And that resulted in the 2015 year of frequent MRT breakdowns & the October 2017 flood issues. The aftermath of 2017 flooding issue were investigated. Now, the new issue of FALSIFICATION OF MAINTENANCE RECORDS by SMRT staff were discovered & added to the litany of MRT problems.
2. NO BUILT-IN REDUNDANCY & NO ALTERNATIVE TRACK MECHANISM
In Japan & NY Metro, they have a built-in redundancy mechanism which allows passengers to bypass & take an alternative rail service whenever there is a breakdown in train service on a particular line. Most rail systems have alternative tracks lines to bypass certain train stations in event of maintenance or service breakdowns. But SMRT stations were constructed as 2-track systems without an alternative bypass track – Why?
SMRT hasn’t had any redundancy nor an alternate track mechanism – resulting in total breakdown which could had been avoided.

PAP culture began with a majority of founder members evidently wanting to build a nation. At that time, the concept of a nation to these dedicated & capable members was the welfare of the populace in terms of financial basic sustainibility to afford their basic necessities, housing with a mission that every citizen must be able to have a roof which they could call it their owm over their heads, healthcare for all including those with the lowest pay and education for all children. Thus the country grew with the increasing trust in these dedicated & capable men. LKY became an ardent and suave spokeman for these dedicated able ministers & inevitably & unfortunately building a one man culture, a forerunner to nepotism. Citizend worked hard in tandem with the clearly defined policy and nation progressed rapidly.

ISA was overlooked by the general public with indoctrination of the fear of Communism thru the oratorical skill of LKY. Whether LKY shed tears publicly for the worry of the country or for his personal hurt and ego, it didnt matter as the citizenry is bent on making a good homeland for themselves.The dedication and the ministers, the nation grew rapidly & taken rather seriously by the world. However the intolerance of political opposition mounted with the arrogance expressed thru the orator.
On hindsight the arrogance really centered only on a few ministers noticeably not those dedicated eg noticeably GKS, LKS & a few others. The nepotic obssession began to surface after public great disappointment with the mass walkout of Parliament by Barisan Socialis MPs and cleverly exploited by LKY. This led to PAP complete control and began the nepotic mission aided by the recruitment of plps. The relentless pursuit of Nepotism & plpism grows rapidly. The nation continued to progress but the egoism, arrogance, plpism, self glorificatin and strikingly self gratification accelerated surpassing citizens desperate strive for a better life. The initial objective of working towards the welfare of the citizenry eroded rapidly. Intolerance of criticism extends from political opponents to include ordinary citizens. Opacity increases rapidly to the extent that it is the PAP god damn right to do so. Plp population grows to becomes the nepotic army. The modern PAP culture as publicly revealed is essentially greed. hunger and aggressiveness to effect self gratification & glorification. Service and welfare of citizenry fade to non existence. Self becomes the order of the day for the nepotists & plps.

Pathetic to see how greed & egoism destroy self and party. It is a lesson for all aspire to enter politics. Not willing to serve above self interest, join other profession and gain human values and pride. Politic and self are…

Shit, enough of wayang performer Khaw, the idiotic Ex SAF Head of Defence Quek, who continuously thumbing down at his ex SAF underling LTA CEO.
Just expect more wayang shows from these trio, seniority at Ministerial and SAF hierarchy status still counts, even for retired SAF personnel.
So LTA must say Yes sir to Desmond, that’s how it works in Singapore.
LTA forced to go soft on Desmond, even Khaw has to, he wants to give Desmond another 5 more years to transform the SAF culture onto SMRT Amazon one, the disgruntled lower level staff would continue to tell the useless Quek to continue to fly kite.
Must give the still in nappy SMRT CEO another 5 more years lah.

Did this $8 cow reveal why the maintenance crew falsified the maintenance records for the pumps.Were they plain dishonest,or were there other reasons like the moral was extremely low.Were they running around like headless chicken fixing the forever breaking down train that they have no time doing maintenance on the pumps.

If the maintenance crew was plain dishonest just sack them including Mr Khaw as he is full of LIES & SHIT.He does not take responsibility.He pushes all the blame to the maintenance team for the pumps.He believqesq

Ha ha so now $8 heart bypass is throwing out every excuse he can think of. That’s good, keep the excuses coming, it just keeps showing how good you are as transport minister.

We were told, more than once if I might add, that Singapore had the best talents, did we not? Oh, how the PAP loved to highlight this fact back in the 80s and 90s and how their dead founder used this to jack up their salaries in the great pay hike of the 90s. We remember all that.

We also remember being told that the MRT was already planned for as were the various HDB estates coming up in the east, west and north. Fast forward into the 21st century and we see that the current government is too obssessed with making money and that the train system just cannot make it. In fact it has gotten worse since 2011 or so.

These clever dicks thought that by changing the sleepers, upgrading and buying new trains and increasing the number of trains would magically solve everything. Guess their pigheadedness didn’t tell them that the train system wasn’t built to handle 5.11 million people huh.

And the even better thing is that now they want to buy new trains to replace the first batch which has been running since 1987. These idiots still want 7 million and beyond on the island so just expect even more frequent train disruptions. Don’t be surprised that these become so common taht you get them every alternate day. Once when you go to work and once when you balek!

Founders of PAP vowed to create a Singapore for all Singaporeans and they respected the God they each swore to on taking the office. They thought, created and worked to achieved what they vowed to do.
LKY has a personal lofty mission to create a dynasty and the mission became self gratification and fulfilment of nepotic goals. He achieved with the building of a personal army of polanpas to do as he bid. Nepotic succession did come about but unfortunately, the genes was not passed on wholesomely. Degeneration set in fast as a result of acute self gratification and glorification at the expense of fast decline of citizens quality of life extending the rich poor gap to breaking limits. The mission is self self and self. Culture is to get greedier, hungier and more aggressive to get what desired, a tone embodied on an advice to the PAP controlled labor camp on their dispeasure of job cteation for foreigners in how to ‘steal’ the jobs from the foreigners imported in hordes by PAP to sustain their new mission of SRLF.

Watch the Netflix show call designated survivor . There was a scene wheee the president, a person who is recognised as good heart, good man and has strong integrity wanted to Go with his decision to carry out an air strike on America soil on a terrorist to save America. However this was opposed by congress who is against setting precedence and when his advisor asked why permission was not granted as president has good heart and all good intends, the congress women replied saying by giving the president the power to do this time, they are setting a bad precedent for future president and what is to prevent president who is rogue to act on his free will .

In Singapore we took a lot of short cuts in early days by granting free will to a lot of things government can or do. While we get a lot of speed in execution, it relies on the team who is capable and effective in their execution. Our pioneer even turn a blind eye to some of the suing against opponent as they think that given this trust, government has a good heart and has the resolve to solve other areas of issues with.

what is our insurance now that precedence is set and mechanism available to go after oppponents and Parliment has a lot of copy cat Politicians who use tactics of our founding Father but deliver peanuts to us .

Khaw’s caws reveal a lot, and its not good at all.
To look at rail reliability as a “multi-year war”, is
to enter the “fray” with a defeatist attitude. It
means you only react. You are not pro-active. The
goal is not seen as stimulating and challenging,
in fact its not even a goal, but a pain in the a**.

His claim that “constant” changes in leadership are
a “sure strategy for failure” is just as big a downer.
Look at what’s happening without a change in leadership!

Changing after a 5-yr run is hardly “constant”. Ministers
are moved around more frequently than that! (Hmmm is that
why they all perform so badly, though all kinds of other
things indicate other things, like the inability to think).
And is he criticising his lord and master, LKY, who
believed that those who failed on the job should make
way for someone else? We’re not looking at a small glitch
here, but regular, frequent and large screw-ups. Hey,
even the design of the system he now claims is wrong! So
we were told a bunch of lies way back by people who
couldn’t deliver? Nothing new, we’re looking at the
same thing now…

He really should not have been “puzzled” how trains in
London n NY run 24 hours, but “curious”. There’s a large
difference between the two. As running 24 hours is not new,
the planners should have known right from the start. That’s
how real professionals work. And if what they learn
can’t be applied, they work on alternatives. So the rot
goes back 30 years? And has spread like crazy now?

Then the whine about budget “constraints” OK, so we had
to watch the money, but that was 30 years ago!! Right now,
there are supposed to be BILLIONS of $s shaking legs.

Khaw’s caws highlight the many things wrong with this govt,
n the current leadership. It’s excuses all the way, blaming
others, sticking to old ways, a refusal to change etc etc.
(Donald Low just gave a good insight on all this.)
Real leaders don’t behave this way. We wouldn’t be where we
are now if Keng Swee, Kim San, Chin Chye, Raja, Barker and
the rest of the gang were as mentally fettered. Things started
going wrong when the boss man replaced them, and got worse
as the army took over (in case of a freak election).

Its obvious we need people with the same passion and drive,
the same dreams and imagination, as the old-timers – who didn’t
have experience but had fire in their belly and mental nimbleness.
Gutsy fellows. Real volunteers, like Kim San. Just doing the job
because it’s there hasn’t cut it… for a long time!! And tt’s
now so very obvious….

With outsourcing as the management buzzword, right from the very top, both Temasek and Government top if the top, it is no wonder that outsourcing becomes an accountability issue. The right way forward is to insource, insource and insource, so that the culture of accountability can be rebuild.